You have to admire Democrats for their audacity. They claimed for more than a year that the clearly declining Joe Biden was mentally fit enough to serve another four years. When the June debate made that untenable, they did a 180-degree turn and anointed his Vice President as their nominee while claiming, without so much as a nod of embarrassment, that she somehow represents “a new way forward.”

Republicans could never pull off that one. And in the end neither has Ms. Harris, if you take her at her word. Asked on “The View” on Oct. 8 what she might do differently from the last four years, Mr. Biden’s loyal number two said, “There is not a thing that comes to mind.” That was the truest line spoken in what has been a notably dishonest and dispiriting election campaign on both sides.

Ms. Harris has presented herself as new based largely on her biography. But as far as policies and coalition go, she represents more of the same, and not merely of the last four years. Her candidacy is best understood as an attempt to continue the progressive political wave that began in 2006 with the GOP defeat in Congress and rolled ashore as a tsunami amid the financial panic of 2008. She is running for what essentially would be Barack Obama’s fourth progressive term.